Validation of Registration, Medical and Other Documents

A special procedure of certification (legalization) is necessary to make a document issued by a certain state legal in other state. Most embassies and consulates conduct validation of documents reffered to as “apostille”.

International statutory acts exclusively regulate the way of certification. That is why only specialists thoroughly aware of international norms and procedures shall be engaged into legalization.

Consular legalization of documents means confirmation of document conformity to the legislation of the state of origin. It constitutes certification of a signature of an official, his/her position and, in some cases, seal of an authorized state body on the documents in order to use them legally in other state.

Foreign documents, supposed to be used on the territory of Ukraine, can be legalized on the territory of the state of document issuance, or directly in Ukraine. In case of legalization of such a document on the territory of another state, the document is firstly certified at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or another authorized state body where the document was issued and then is legalized by the consular institution of Ukraine in this state

Embassy legalization is performed according to the rules of a certain embassy. These rules can significantly differ as well as terms of legalization (from 1 to 10 days).

Apostille — is a special international stamp valid for all member states of the Hague Convention Abolishing the Requirement of Legalization for Foreign Public Documents from October 5, 1961. Value of the Hague Convention (apostille) is that documents certified by apostille in one member state of Convention are to be accepted in other member state of Convention without any restrictions.

To have documents stamped by apostille, you have to provide document originals. Only sometimes apostille is stamped on the copies certified by a notary.

In Ukraine apostille on the birth certificate of a child is stamped by the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine.

Order of apostille marking is regulated not only by Ukrainian state authorities but also by embassies of the countries which require apostille. For example, some countries (Switzerland, Austria, Belgium and others) demand double apostille to transfer child to home country of Intended Parents. This means that apostille is to be stamped not only on the documents but also on translated copies certified by a notary. Thereby this procedure includes apostille marking on document originals as well as on translated copies certified by a notary after their translation and certification.